Straighten the Paths

Isaiah 35:3-4 (ISV) Strengthen the feeble hands, and support the stumbling knees. Say to those with anxious hearts, 'Be strong, do not be afraid! Here is your God. He will bring vengeance, He will bring divine retribution, and He will save you.

The feeble and faint-hearted are encouraged. This is the design of the good news God has given us in Jesus Christ. Fear is weakening but God says to us, "Be strong," and gives us hope for One who is mighty who will take vengeance on the powers of darkness, and give abundant comforts to those that mourn. He will come and save and give those who were troubled, rest

Hebrews 12:12 Strengthen your tired arms and your weak knees, and straighten the paths of your life, so that your lameness many not become worse, but instead may be healed.

A burden of affliction is apt to make the Christian's hands hang down, and his knees grow feeble, to dispirit him and discourage him; but against this he must strive, that he may better run his spiritual race and course. Faith and patience enable believers to follow peace and holiness, as a man follows his calling constantly, diligently, and with pleasure. Peace with men, of all sects and parties, will be favorable to our pursuit of holiness. But peace and holiness go together; there can be not right peace without holiness. Where persons fail of having the true grace of God, corruption will prevail and break forth; beware lest any unmortified lust in the heart, which seems to be dead, should spring up, to trouble and disturb the whole body. Falling away from Christ is the fruit of preferring the delights of the flesh, to the blessing of God, and the heavenly inheritance. Henry, Matthew. Matthew Henry’s Commentary on the Whole Bible : Complete and Unabridged. Peabody, Mass., Hendrickson Publishers, 1991.